Library Buildings around the World

Thurles Arts Centre and Library, Thurles – Ireland 2006
1.350 m², € 5.875.000
This building’s geometries arise out of its very particular location - crouched like a cat at the medieval gate of Thurles and stretched
around a bend in the river Suir. A singular folded roof encloses very different volumes, rising and falling like a small mountain
range from a strong base - the boardwalk extended over the river. Crisp zinc planes define the library/media zone from the arts and
theatre spaces, the entire building cranking to face the river with sheer planes of glass .Two storeys of library and research space are
coupled to the high volume of the auditorium by the lower entrance and arts space. In the library a deep cut in the ceiling plane
brings light and air to the centre of the plan. The exhibition space has a similar slice through the roof plane to conduct daylight. An
introverted, reflective space, its walls splay out towards the riverfront, taking up the geometry of the site. Shielded behind the
monolithic concrete entrance wall, the space can be glimpsed through a porthole when arriving, or alternatively closed off for
hanging. The theatre foyer is similarly a compressed volume caught between auditorium and boardwalk.
( http://www.worldarchitecturenews.com )
Thurles Library is located in The Source Library and Arts Centre. The building enjoys a riverside setting on banks of the river Suir,
adjacent to the town bridge, with a fully accessible riverside boardwalk. A single undulating zinc-clad roof encloses the two functions
of the building, with a shared roof-lit exhibition space providing a central focus. The shared entrance and foyer ensures users of one
element of the building are made aware of the other. The narrow, elongated site is located on a bend in the river. A glass facade
faces out onto the river. The branch library is on the ground floor and the Tipperary Studies Department and community space is on
the 1st floor. Throughout the building colour has been used to indicate function; red for information, orange for vertical circulation
and white and black for concentration and relaxation. A rooflight brings natural light and venitilation into the research area on the
1st floor. (http://www.librarybuildings.ie)
Waterford City Library, Waterford – Ireland 2004
2000 m², € 5.000.000
The existing public library on Lady Lane in Waterford City required complete refurbishment and an extension onto an adjoining
site (an undertaker’s yard) to provide better library and information resource facilities for the 21st century. Constructed in 1905, the
existing building has a Classical facade in smooth sawn Kilkenny limestone; a lower elevation of rusticated limestone to Bakehouse
Lane was terminated by a small caretaker’s/librarian’s house. Internally,the spaces centred on a double height roof-lit reading
room; the plan had been substantially altered during extensive remedial works carried out in the 1970s. The project – now L shaped
with the addition of the new site- offered opportunities for juxtaposition between a modern building and layered intervention into
the fabric- especially in the manipulation of section and light to create a new diagonal circulation across the plan. The existing
entrance was closed up and transferred to the extension;this new block fills the site with entrance and mezzanine within the same
volume at ground floor- there is a library level over and staff facilities in a set-back floor which emerges out of the new building and
extends across to pin the existing library: the floors stop short of the rear wall to provide a full-height void. Internally ,the existing
building was renewed and the double height reading room lined out with a dark timber skin which hides and reveals the old
structure beneath it;balconies cross it at different levels .The space between old and new is fluid;there is a sense of the external
envelope running from board-marked concrete to painted brickwork.Using light and section,the project tries to forge a link between
the elements ,moving from entrance mezzanine to reading room across the plan. A new storey was also added to Bakehouse Lane ,
echoing the language of the new extension, making it a three- dimensional city block rather than a flat street elevation on Lady Lane
alone. Facade choices were made to establish the continuity of limestone across the new elevation, but the new works were given a
different stone patterning to establish their integrity. (McCullough)
Waterford Central Library & HQ is a four-storey L-shaped building, extending to 2,000 square metres, refurbished and extended
from the original Carnegie Library, built in 1905. For an early photograph from the National Library of Ireland's collection
depicting the laying of the foundation stone of Waterford Free Library by Andrew Carnegie click here. The library occupies a
prominent corner site. The foyer, adult lending and children's library are located on the ground floor; the exhibition space,
newspapers & magazines, and local studies and research area are on the first floor; the Business & ICT Information area, music and
audio-visual areas are on the 2nd floor. The 3rd floor contains staff offices, facilities and the plant room. The building was extended
into an adjoining undertaker's yard in 2004. The extension incorporates part of the 12th century city wall. The floors stop short of
the rear wall to provide a full-height roof-lit void. Interesting bridge connections link different areas of the library. The interior is
finished in American walnut wood panelling, exposed brickwork and concrete board marked walls. The exterior of the original
building is finished in Kilkenny cut limestone ashlar. Some of the architectural features of the original classical style Carnegie
library are full-height doric pilasters, roundheaded windows, string course, cornices, parapet and a floating pediment. The building
receives natural lighting from floor to ceiling windows, lightwells and rooflights, and is naturally ventilated throughout with
openable windows. The reference room can be divided into two spaces using a sliding partition. ( http://www.librarybuildings.ie )
Rush Library, Dublin – Ireland 2003
St Maur’s Church dominates the village green on the Western edge of Rush: Fingal County Council commissioned McCullough
Mulvin Architects to transform it into the town library. The work combined investigation and conservation of the existing structure
with a particular concern for the rescue of ordinary materials, making a distinctive intervention into it ,an undulating walnut plane
which fills the nave, the shape barely contained, pushing tensely against the older shell. On plan, it is like a clump of seaweed,
reference to its marine location; in section, it forms an inverted U, the space between, formed like a city street, deforms the route
from entrance to ‘altar’, forcing it to meander, glimpses of a coloured termination lost and found again. Externally, the churchyard
became a garden, strips of concrete inset with names of the town and library interspersed with channels planted with grasses and
vegetables, the spirit of the graveyard- and the towns agricultural basis- extended for a new generation.
(McCullough)
Usher Library, Trinity College, Dublin – Ireland 2002
The new Ussher Library in Trinity College is a landmark building for Dublin. The project - initiated as an international
architectural competition design collaboration with KMD Architecture- provides 750 undergraduate reader places and space for
350,00 volumes in a state-of-the-art library building with exposed boardmarked concrete and granite finishes. The concept
establishes three prismatic sculptural blocks on a podium set North-South across the site; the two longer blocks are connected by an
atrium. The taller is closed and stone-clad and dedicated to book storage (a tower of books), the other, lower, more dynamically
shaped in stone and glass- contains reading rooms with views over College Park; the third block is for a Book Conservation
Laboratory. Each block is served by a core at one end which anchors the plan; each is designed as a solid planar element without
advance or recession- the line of stone cladding is carried through into the atrium in timber panelling.The atrium glazing is
perceived as a separate shard-like element, while the Conservation Block roof is an origami -like folded plane of glass and metal. The
new building forms a functional unit with the existing Berkeley and Lecky libraries - all three are connected under podium level the
Berkeley has been retained as the main entrance to the whole complex - a new staircase descends from it to a new orientation space
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